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Talks are underway between representatives of the Taliban and Pakistan's government. Meanwhile, the U.S. appears to have slowed the pace of drone attacks on Pakistan, which may be intended to allow Islamabad to pursue these peace talks. NPR's Scott Simon talks to Shuja Nawaz, the director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council.

A curious series of hieroglyphics appears in the first pages of the classic 1984 textbook, Lectures on Macroeconomics. Recently experts decoded the symbols and were surprised to find a poem. NPR's Scott Simon speaks with the book's co-author, Olivier Blanchard, and his daughter, Serena. Ms. Blanchard was just 8 years old when she wrote the verse that has puzzled economics students for generations.

The United Nations has just released a grim report on civilian casualties in Afghanistan over the last year. Casualties rose 14 percent in 2013, with nearly 3,000 people killed and more than 5,500 injured.

More people in their late 20s are living at home with Mom and Dad than any previous generation. In a column for Bloomberg News, Zara Kessler argues that faced with a dismal economy, today's 20-somethings are redefining success in adulthood. NPR's Scott Simon speaks with Kessler about the cultural shift.

In the animated world, just about anything goes: Toys talk, mice are chefs, and pandas do kung fu. In animation, the sky's the limit. In this encore broadcast, we learn about the hundreds of people working on big studio features who spend their days figuring out how to manufacture this silliness from the ground up. (This story originally aired on All Things Considered on Nov. 27, 2013.)

A Spanish-led consortium working to build a new lock system to accommodate larger ships says it will stop work until a deal is reached.

Project Runway's Tim Gunn "makes it work," John Powers says Borgen is Denmark's West Wing (but better), and Jennifer Senior explores the trials and triumphs of parenting in her book All Joy and No Fun.

The Syrian Red Crescent says its workers were wounded as they tried to deliver aid to a rebel-held section of the besieged city of Homs.

Writer and comedian Hari Kondabolu speaks with NPR's Arun Rath about India being excluded from the Olympics, a controversial Coke commercial, and comments from Sen. Pat Roberts from Kansas during the confirmation hearings for surgeon general nominee Dr. Vivek Murthy.

Many of Marilyn Nelson's most famous poetry collections are for children. Her latest work, How I Discovered Poetry, is a memoir about her own childhood, which was spent traveling around the country in the 1950s as the daughter of an Air Force pilot.